Yesterday, Gouzi talked to you about the Swiss K31 rifle. Today, I suddenly thought of whether it is possible to open a pit of Swiss light weapons, so I will talk to you about the Swiss machine gun-MG51. And this product looks very much like MG42, and by the way, is there any relationship between them.
It is said that during World War II, the Swiss crouched their legs on the top of the mountain to watch the excitement of European countries playing below. Of course, while eating melons, one has to think about the development of new weapons. Since it is a mountainous country, light weapons are still more important.
At that time, the Germans' platoon tactics mostly revolved around machine guns, and whether it was MG34 or MG42, the gameplay of this general machine gun really made the Swiss look jealous. Especially their machine gun at the time was the Maxim-style MG11 and the LMG25
which looked unreliable from the looks of it. By 1942, Switzerland felt that the MG42 was too fragrant, so Plan to purchase a batch and change it to its own 7.5x55mm caliber. But at the time, the Germans themselves were not enough to do this business with Switzerland. Switzerland is thinking about buying from Czechoslovakia, but Slovakia is already a German turf, so the business is dying... Switzerland can only stand on its own.
In the same year, the Swiss War Technology Department started tendering and bidding. There are three companies in the company-the Swiss state-owned Bern military factory, SIG and Hispano, but in the end only the Bernese MG42 copycat was shortlisted.
By 1944, the first prototype gun came out. The early prototype was almost copied from the MG42, including the principle of retreating the tube and the roller-type locking bolt. However, because retreat guns are not friendly to accuracy (the Swiss are crazy about accuracy), some prototypes later tried to use the semi-free gun mechanism. But it was also shelved because of the accuracy problem. I didn't find out what kind of semi-free gun. I guess the reason for the poor accuracy is that the Swiss GP11 has a very high chamber pressure, and the locking strength of the semi-free gun is insufficient.
Soon, World War II is over and the Swiss have no sense of urgency. The upright MG51 just looks at the name and knows that it was officially equipped in the 1950s.
Although it looks like MG42, the final finished product of MG51 is still somewhat different from MG42.
For example, the MG51 gun body is milled, which does not inherit the MG42 for easy production. And the use of stamping parts, so the weight of MG51 is much larger than MG42 (MG51 weighs 16 kg, MG42 weighs 11.5 kg).
MG42 is a roller lock, but the Swiss feel that this lock cannot be accurately unlocked when the tube is withdrawn... So the Swiss, who has a rib in the Bieder stick, uses a card-iron support opening lock similar to DP28 (You can also call him fish gill lock)
The Swiss felt that the MG42's rate of fire was too fast, and the instantaneous recoil caused by raising the rate of fire would also make the gun inaccurate, so they reduced the rate of fire of MG51 by 1000 Send the following.
In addition, the style and vents of the muzzle assist are also different from those of the MG42. But the MG51 has inherited the quick-change barrel design of the MG42.
MG51 has been equipped by the Swiss army until now since it was equipped with Switzerland in 1951. Of course, the caliber has been changed to 7.62 NATO. In addition, the general-purpose machine gun is basically not off work in modern times, but mainly exists as a vehicle-mounted weapon.
